@PatchworkMind oooh, interesting. distance learning could be good. do you think that is your preference (if you could easily choose either)?

i'm considering pursuing enrollment in such a program, but i've been doing "movement work" for a decade-ish and am generally wary of going "back to school" - particularly for something that (forgive me) may not be immediately practical for me.

i want to write about the work i've done, as well as some general social commentary - largely non-fiction.

@emily If I could choose freely, I'd choose Brick and Mortar over distance with the Open University.

I did another course with the OU before I did this one with occasional face to face; there's none of that with this one and it's noticeably lacking.

Really speaking, unless you need the qualification, you could probably learn what you need yourself. What the course does offer is good critique through access to other learners at your level and feedback from experienced lecturers etc.

@emily To be honest, I don’t get paid for writing yet, although I am currently looking into marketing. I think a marketing/copywriting course could be more practical in terms of career prospects. A creative writing course mostly works in a way that has very generic sections like prose, poetry, prose from an omniscient point of view, prose from a first person point of view... What they mostly tell you is basic: 1st pow = unreliable narrator etc. Homework: go and write such story

@emily What I am mostly trying to say, and I was there hoping for it for 3 years, is that I had initially thought, never got, that we’d be discovering different elements of writing specifically, like how to best shape a rounded character, what readers care about in a character, what kind of things cause different emotional responses from reader, what is the underlying social goal of horror, examples of controversial novels, what was their strategy, where are they shocking etc

@emily Journalism, or media studies may also come in more handy then creative writing, if you want to work with stories. I recommend you just read some good books about creative writing, like King’s ‘’On Writing’’ and watch the writing workshops by Brandon Sanderson here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=N4ZDBOc2tX8 (explore the entire playlist of course.